[NatureNS] Global warming

From: Christopher Majka <c.majka@ns.sympatico.ca>
To: naturens@chebucto.ns.ca
Date: Thu, 5 Jun 2008 01:27:35 -0300
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Hi Lois,

As Andy Moir wrote:

> Then you might want to visit this page to learn who is really behind  
> the petition project.
> http://www.ucsusa.org/global_warming/science/skeptic- 
> organizations.html
> Andy Moir

The Union of Concerned Scientists points out that this  
"petition" (around since 1998) was privately funded by:
George Marshall Institute

This conservative think tank shifted its focus from Star Wars to  
climate change in the late 1980s. In 1989, the Marshall Institute  
released a report claiming that "cyclical variations in the intensity  
of the sun would offset any climate change associated with elevated  
greenhouse gases." Though refuted by the IPCC, the report was very  
influential in influencing the Bush Sr. Administration's climate  
change policy. The Marshall Institute has since published numerous  
reports downplaying the severity of global climate change.

Oregon Institute of Science and Medicine

The Marshall Institute co-sponsored with the OISM a deceptive campaign  
-- known as the Petition Project -- to undermine and discredit the  
scientific authority of the IPCC and to oppose the Kyoto Protocol.  
Early in the spring of 1998, thousands of scientists around the  
country received a mass mailing urging them to sign a petition calling  
on the government to reject the Kyoto Protocol. The petition was  
accompanied by other pieces including an article formatted to mimic  
the journal of the National Academy of Sciences. Subsequent research  
revealed that the article had not been peer-reviewed, nor published,  
nor even accepted for publication in that journal and the Academy  
released a strong statement disclaiming any connection to this effort  
and reaffirming the reality of climate change. The Petition resurfaced  
in 2001.

I don't take this "petition" at face value. The facts of climate  
change speak for themselves irrespective of what we may be sick of  
hearing or not. I urge you and other interested readers to read the  
the report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and make  
up your own mind.

http://www.ipcc.ch/

I also urge you and interested readers to read the Wikipedia article  
on scientific opinion on climate change:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scientific_opinion_on_climate_change

Listed and linked there are statements of 35 of the most prominent  
scientific organizations in the world that largely follow or endorse  
the IPCC position that, "An increasing body of observations gives a  
collective picture of a warming world and other changes in the climate  
system ... There is new and stronger evidence that most of the warming  
observed over the last 50 years is attributable to human activities."

I also urge you and interested readers to read the Wikipedia article  
on climate change denial:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Climate_change_denial

Last October I was fortunate to see CBC-TV's Fifth Estate excellent  
documentary on the climate change denial movement called, "The Denial  
Machine". For those who are interested the video is available at:

http://www.cbc.ca/fifth/denialmachine/

There is an excellent list of 16 web sites pertaining to the climate  
change denial movement

http://www.cbc.ca/fifth/denialmachine/resources.html

Text interviews  of people in the film and if you have Windows Media  
player you can even watch the documentary and update online with  
streaming video. Decide for yourselves if you can trust the  
pronouncements, petitions, and disinformation produced by the climate  
change denial industry.

Best wishes,

Chris



On 4-Jun-08, at 11:11 PM, Lois Codling wrote:

> Hi Chris,
>
> I have taken a few days to answer your e-mail because, to tell the  
> truth, it made me really angry.  Name-calling is not part of the  
> scientific method, as far as I am aware.  Philosophically it is  
> called an "ad hominum" (to the man) argument, and is a logical  
> fallacy because it doesn't deal with the argument at all, but with  
> the man presenting the argument.  Your e-mail apparently accused  
> 31,000 American scientists, including over 9000 Ph.D.'s, of every  
> politically incorrect view going.
>
> I guess I must be a consensus denier as well.  I am heartily sick of  
> hearing that the consensus of scientists is that human-caused  
> climate change is undeniable.  As the scientists who signed the  
> Petition Project state, "if there is a consensus among American  
> scientists, it is in opposition to the human-caused global warming  
> hypothesis rather than in favor of it."  The large number of  
> scientists who signed clearly shows that there is no consensus in  
> the sense you are implying. They claim that the Project includes 15- 
> times more scientists than are seriously involved in the United  
> Nations IPPC process.  See their website at: http://www.petitionproject.org/index.html
>
> I personally have no stake in, or connection to the Petition  
> Project.  I have only recently learned of its existence.  But I am  
> concerned for truth, and for freedom of speech.  The path to truth  
> is by dealing with arguments, not by slinging mud.
>
> Lois Codling
>
>
>
> Christopher Majka wrote:
>> Hi folks,
>>
>> There are a coterie of climate change deniers who (primarily for  
>> ideological, or more frequently financial, reasons) would like to  
>> keep alive the notion that anthropogenic climate change is still a  
>> "debatable" topic. It is interesting (and insightful) that many of  
>> these same people, organizations, public relations and ad firms,  
>> etc. that constitute the "denial industry" are (in one guise or  
>> another) the same as those who were employed by the tobacco  
>> industry for years making claims that there was no evidence that  
>> smoking was related to lung cancer.
>>
>> They have also borrowed tactics from the Holocaust denial movement,  
>> and those who deny the reality of evolution, trying to couch their  
>> arguments in pseudo-scientific terms and arguing that they are  
>> presenting another perspective on what is still a debatable issue.  
>> It is a dreadful and disgraceful tactic.
>>
>> For those who are interested there is an excellent discussion of  
>> this movement (with citations and link